


Stilted, Pretending Days

by scullyseviltwin



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-05
Updated: 2012-06-05
Packaged: 2017-11-06 23:57:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/424625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scullyseviltwin/pseuds/scullyseviltwin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“…he’s never lied to her. Why start now?” Ben in Washington and the struggles of a long distance relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stilted, Pretending Days

Jenn is more helpful than she ought to be really, finding him a nice sublet near Dupont. “The owner is going out to Chicago to try his hand at comedy? I don’t know, I remember Chicago and I guess I assume comedy but he’s subletting at a really reasonable price, let me know!”

Her words all blur together in the voicemail and Ben finds himself smiling. He’s got a contact in D.C., a woman who’s a power player and though they’re not really friends, he finds the notion of uprooting his recently-rooted life a bit less bitter.

There isn’t much to pack up and what he doesn’t want to take with him, Leslie has carefully suggested he stow away at her place for “when he gets back.” Her words are spoken softly, like the inevitability of his return isn’t as inevitable as she’d once hoped. Leslie strokes his cheek and doesn’t cry - his brave girl with her brave face - and he wants to tell her that he’s sorry he’s leaving, but he’s not.

And he’s never lied to her. Why start now?

She stands on the sidewalk and watches as his Subaru (smart, affordable, good for someone with kids, or at least a dog) pulls to the end of Elm and then disappears out of sight.

He wars with himself; this feels like an end and a beginning, both tinged in sepia. It’s bittersweet really, but he feels entirely too guilty that when he pulls onto the freeway, he feels like an adventure waiting for him and he can’t wait to meet it.

 

\---

 

Leslie doesn’t call him on the way. If he heard her voice right now, even with this new found sense of adventure in him he might turn right around

It’s ten hours and too-much-Buckeye State for it to be a nice drive and he’s thankful that she doesn’t try and pretend it’s going to be. Nice, that it. It’s central Ohio, not-even-Cleveland and it’s bleak and caffeine-filled and what feels like eons of Dunkin Donuts and Wilco albums on repeat.

He mentally reviews the dossier on the candidate; he’s nearly memorized it by now. His achievements, where he stands on the issues, but Ben still goes over and over them in his mind, unsure that he’s really prepared for this.

God, will he ever be? He doesn't know, doesn't know.

When the sun begins to set he opens the windows and slows to fifty, wanting to smell the air of somewhere _different_.

 

\---

 

He texts to tell her he’s arrived - after some arguing with the garage attendant that yes, he’s subletting for Chu in seven B, yes, yes, oh my god, yes - one box all he’s found the energy to drag up the stairs with him.

“Made it safe and sound, checking out my new place! Miss you already, oh no!” he sends out into the void and places his phone on the granite breakfast bar, watches the screen. Ben waits for a minute and then five and ten and when she doesn’t respond immediately he’s a bit sad. _He’s_ a bit sad but it all hits him, tons of bricks and all that, just what did he expect would happen? They haven’t really discussed how all of this will _work_ except that they’re both too stubborn for it not to work, and he has faith in them.

As a couple.

It’s only been _a day_ , not even. The coming months, if any inkling of how he feels now is an indication will be confusing as hell and not a little bit excruciating. Ben remembers that it’s three weeks until she officially takes seat as city councilwoman and wonders if he’ll be able to feign illness for a day, fly back. Just the thought of her... and it’s only been thirteen hours.

It throws him into reminiscing about the color of her hair, her eyes, her scents and wondering about the possibilities for what she would have said upon entering this apartment.

“It’s big!” probably. “Really, really, big.”

And it is big. He doesn’t want to think about how big and empty it seems, so he finds Stephen Chu’s bedroom (his bedroom, now, for the time being, _his_ ) and falls into it, sleeps with all of his clothing on.

 

\---

 

He wakes up to a District morning, the city rushing by beneath his window, everyone moving with an importance that’s inherent to the nation’s capital. Ben unfolds himself and stretches, immediately regretting his decision to fall asleep fully-clothed; he pads to the kitchen, hardwood floors gleaming in the sunlight streaming through the enormous windows and Ben finds himself wondering how the hell he got so lucky.

And, well, unlucky too, he supposes.

And of course it has to be this way for him, doesn’t it? Leaving the love of his life back in Indiana while he pursues his dream here. She’s living her dream there and... at some point their dreams have to be the same thing, right? There has to be some common denominator, specifically in geography. Right?

Too early for those types of thoughts and he blesses Stephen Chu for his ownership of a Kuerig; Ben pops a pod in the machine and boots up his laptop. In a moment he’s logging into his mail where he finds an urgent message from Jenn, asking him into the office as soon as he can possibly manage.

No time to properly investigate the transit system, or find a coffee shop around the apartment. Just a shower and a shave and he hops on the Metro, tries not to glance around at his fellow commuters too much, tries to contain the excitement and trepidation.

 

\---

 

It’s a good thing that Ben can swim because he’s not thrown into the deep end so much as catapulted. Jenn tosses him in a cube towards the back of the Congressman’s headquarters.

“These are your cards, you know how to network but know these are the only cards you get, choose wisely who you give them to. Your phone, your, here’s your pass, don’t lose that either, replacing that is a giant ass pain, oh and I’m going to need a briefing on,” Jenn pulls a thick sheaf of papers from on top of a passing mail cart, “Resolution 691 by, say, one? Okay? Alright, great, bye!”

Ben isn’t sure he’s able to take a breath the entire time that Jenn speaks and by the time she’s gone he realizes that inhaling might be the way to go. He hunkers down, snatches up a highlighter and begins going over the finer points of the bill, leaving streaks of fluorescent here and there, slamming post its onto the page when something really important crops up.

It’s twelve thirty when he hits the print icon in Word and realizes that he has no idea where he’s just printed to. In a panic, he jogs around the office until he finds someone that _isn’t_ otherwise occupied.

“Hey, I was wondering,” he begins, a little out of breath, a little dizzy. He hasn’t eaten yet today and it’s beginning to catch up with him. The woman at the photocopier turns on heel and glares at him. “Do you know where the hell I just printed to?”

Her face softens for a moment, “New?”

Ben nods sluggishly.

The woman smiles at him, turns to pause her copy job and faces him once more. It takes him a few moments to realize that she’s extended her hand and he takes it. “Kate Glover, assitant to someone you’ve probably not met yet, so for now, just Kate Glover.”

“Ben Wyatt,” he returns. “I’m actually not sure what I’m...”

Kate laughs. “She’ll get around to letting you in on what you’re supposed to be doing, eventually. It’s just, you know, crazy around here right now...”

“Yeah, yeah, I hadn’t been, I guess I didn’t...” Ben doesn’t know what to say, what’s okay to admit this early on.

Kate nods along until he runs out of words and kindly supplies, “Yeah, it’s overwhelming at first but the novelty wears off quickly, I assure you.”

Ben says nothing for a moment, swaying on his feet.

“Right! Copier! It’s in that room through there,” she points across the brightly-lit office to a hallway. “And that’s where the coffee and the bagels are, if you’re early enough to grab one. By now there’s probably only Marble left.”

But the thought of food has him salivating, Marble bagel or no. “Thanks, thank you, Kate!”

She smiles awkwardly after him as he jogs to the break room and shoves a bagel unceremoniously into his face.

 

\---

 

By the time he gets home - seven-thirty, there’s no nine-to-five here - he’s bone weary, the day a blur and it all feels a little like a dream. As he flops down onto the sofa in the living room he realizes he never filled out any paperwork, wasn’t given any health care forms or anything else that one is customarily forced to review on the first day of employment.

It’s then that he realizes how different all of this is going to be, how new, how harried and frantic. This isn’t local politics, he’s playing with the big boys now. It’s exhausting and this is the _first_ day but it’s also brilliant and he feels a rush, just thinking about the scramble to get done what needed to be done.

Because there was someone counting on him.

He keeps his eyes closed as he calls Leslie. And calls Leslie and calls Leslie. After the sixth time of listening to “You’ve reached Leslie Knope. If this is an emergency, please contact-” he leaves a short, tired message.

“Just home from my first day-first day, god, it’s like I’m in grammar school-and I’m... exhausted and overwhelmed and have no idea what’s going on but... it’s good. Counting down for you, just twenty days. Call me before you go to sleep. Love you.”

 

\---

 

Leslie calls at ten-thirty, having just got in from a banquet in her honor. “It was... insane. Thrown by the Chamber of Commerce, so you know it was just overcooked cordon blue and seltzer water and listening to Barry Jefferson recite some personal Pawnee poetry,” she goes on, smile in her voice.

Ben wants to say that yes, he understands what she’s talking about, but there are still some things about Pawnee that he doesn’t understand. “Yeah, you’re gonna need to email me the poem,” Ben says instead, relaxing into bed, cradling the phone against his ear. He details his day for her and she gasps and laughs and placates in all of the proper places.

“My little political power player,” she sighs into the phone and it’s almost enough to stir something within him. “You know how hot it makes me, hearing about your day?” And Leslie’s voice has gone all breathy and wonderful and if he wasn’t so tired...

“Les, you have no idea how much I want to... you know... with you, right now, I’m just-”

And she knows, she _knows_.

Her laugh is warm and sad and tired. “I know, I’m tired too, tomorrow, maybe? After you’re over your first day jitters.”

“Tentative yes,” he ends on a yawn. “I love you, Leslie Knope...”

“And I you, Benjamin Wyatt,” she says in what is quite literally the worst British accent he’s ever heard and it’s enough to send him into a fit of laughter.

“Good night.”

“Good night,” and the grin in her voice sends him to sleep in a wonderful, comfortable state.

 

\---

 

He dreams he’s listening to Blink 182’s “This is Growing Up” but really, it’s his alarm going off at 5:45. Still, the significance of the song isn’t lost on him, really, and that makes him a little embarrassed.

Stephen Chu must have enjoyed pop punk.

 

\---

 

Day two goes much smoother. He gets in before all of the good bagels are gone and Kate takes it upon herself to introduce him around. He’s not surprised that half of those he meets don’t really have the time to exchange pleasantries but the effort is appreciated nonetheless.

Someone from HR has left his employment packet on his desk and he reviews and signs on the dotted line where appropriate while listening to his neighbor’s stream of NPR. When Jenn stops by to snatch him up, he’s finally working on setting up his email and voicemail. “Time to meet the candidate, hurry up, he’s off to a groundbreaking in Bethesda in ten!”

Ben pops out of his seat and like that, the day is off and running again. They’re through the maze of cubicles and free-standing desks in no time, being ushered into a glass-walled office by two harried looking staffers.

“But really, he has to be out of here in ten, which means you have fifteen at the most, if you get me!” one of them calls over their shoulder.

Ben and Jenn (oh dear god, how did he not realize this until now, Ben and Jenn!?) stand in front of a startlingly good looking man who is typing on his computer with one hand while flipping through a large property law tome with the other. “Sorry, sorry, just trying to help my neighbor with his land court dispute... one... minute...”

Candidate Christopher Janx is an ex-property lawyer, turned city councillor, turned mayor, turned state rep turned Congressional candidate out of Miami. From what Ben knows of him, he has it all. The wife, the kids, the heart of gold, the crappy four door sedan that he’s had since he graduated law school that appeals to the values of voters.

He’s the _perfect person_ and Ben is fairly intimidated.

“No rush, Chris,” Jenn says with annoyance, flicking through her iPhone hastily.

“Shut it, Jenn,” the candidate says good naturedly, smiles, and closes the book audibly. “Now, you’re the guy that’s going to be staffing me?” He stands and offers Ben his hand and for a moment his vision swims. _Staffing!?_

“Dylan quit, you’re his new Chief of Staff, you’re all caught up on his CV Chris, sure you wanna do this?” And Chris gives Ben the once over, still holding his hand.

Ben tries to keep his breathing under control; no one had told him he’d be taking a position this... lofty. He’s sure he’s stepping on toes right now, even being in the candidate’s office, but to be in charge of his day-to-day when he’s _just arrived_.

Oh god, oh dear god. _Ohdeargodchrist_.

“Totally sure, Jenn. Always trust a Minnesotan.”

He never thought his being born in Minnesota would work in his favor but it turns out candidate Janx is originally from Duluth.

Go figure.

 

\---

 

“Les, I’m _staffing_ him, I mean...” Ben sighs and rolls out the tension in his back. Yes, he’s sitting in a bath, but he feels he deserves it and anyway, so is she. “Never in my life did I think-”

“Oh stop,” he hears her slosh around in the water for a moment. “Of course you thought, I thought, I imagined you doing this. So, just... stop. You’re good at what you do Ben, you’re so good, why do you think Jenn wants you?”

He ponders on that for a moment. Is he really that good? Is he _this_ good? Has he just been coasting along, missing how great he is at what he does? “Stop thinking,” Leslie chastises him out of his thoughts, “And talk to meeeeee.”

“Sorry, yeah, I just,” but it’s too much to really comprehend right now, so he changes the subject. “It’s only been two days Les and I’m missing you like crazy.”

“What’s one step beyond crazy, because that’s how I’m missing you, Wyatt.” Leslie sighs and if he tries (and not too hard, she’s never too hard to visualize) he can imagine her sinking down into the bubbles and closing her eyes. “Ben, it’s only been two days.”

“I know,” he replies.

“I hate you for making me love you this much,” she squeaks.

“Well, I hate you back, then,” he agrees and sinks down to his chin in the large tub (everything in this apartment is so shockingly _big_ ).

Leslie whispers, “We’re terrible.”

“The worst,” he agrees and they’re silent together on the line for a long, long time.

Leslie eventually speaks, “So, phone sex?”

“Yeah, right,” Ben laughs. “Let’s get on with it then...”

 

\---

 

Days four and five and six blur together until day twelve when Ben stops counting the days he’s been in Washington. He goes out and fully unpacks his car, buys real groceries, picks up a BluRay player (like he’ll ever have time to watch it) and refills for the Kuerig.

He sleeps in on his third Sunday in town and misses Leslie’s call.

When he wakes, he feels positively awful and calls her back immediately but she’s at brunch with Ann, can’t talk.

Of course, brunch takes precedence.

 

\---

 

It’s the night before she’s actually “inaugurated” into city council and she’s been sending him cell photos of her new office, a photo of a photo of the two of them front and center. “So I can look at your stupid face all day,” accompanies the photo.

Ben snaps a shot of the printout of the two of them at April and Andy’s wedding, back before they were what they are, “And so I can see your entirely-too-gorgeous face,” he types.

“Gross :D,” she sends back; attached to that is a photo of Ann waving awkwardly at the camera. “And Ann says hello.”

“Tell Ann I say hi back and I love you. The I love you is for you, of course. And you’re going to be great. Call me as soon as your day is over?”

“Wait by the phone!” she sends.

 

\---

 

The phone rings and rings but he’s in a strategy meeting and though he feels it vibrating in his pocket and knows _exactly_ who’s calling, he can’t actually get away.

 

\---

 

“I called someone a doofus,” she sighs sadly in her voicemail, “But other than that, I think it went really well, my first day. I just wish... I wish you’d picked up.”

He gets the voicemail at around eleven, just as he’s leaving the office and for the first time in a long time, Ben Wyatt feels like a truly bad man. Something in his throat bunches and he dials her number as he’s descending in the elevator. Two, three rings...

He settles on a bench in front of the office, settles in, but after six rings it goes to voicemail and Ben has to wonder, is she sitting there watching his name fizzle out on the home screen or has she once again fallen asleep with her phone on?

Ben shoves his phone into his pocket and heads to the Metro.

He sends her a cookie bouquet from his smart phone, doesn’t even notice that he misspells her name ‘Led.’

 

\---

 

May segues into June and by the time Ben stops freaking out that he’s been given such responsibility, he has a full contact list and it’s nearing July. He’s learned how to give a comment that isn’t _really_ a comment and has stopped second-guessing his delegation of tasks to various staffers.

He no longer knocks when he needs to go into Chris’s office, just gives a wave and is invited inside. He’s never, ever, ever wanted to win something so much as he does now, for Chris. He tells this secret to Leslie one evening and feels so entirely ashamed that he closes his eyes as he speaks the words.

She just laughs, “Of course you do, honey, this is much... bigger. Plus, you probably felt the same way _when_ you were working with me.” It’s true enough, but still. That doesn’t stop him from feeling like dirt.

“We’re up, in the latest polls,” he supplies and he knows she knows but he says it anyway, though he doesn’t know why. Maybe just to feel like he’s doing something that’s noticeable, that’s nearly tangible, that he’s been working hard at changing a statistic and it’s working.

“I know,” Leslie says. “But hey, enough about work, I was thinking of maybe coming down there next week? After the 4th tourists have gone home?”

Ben bites his lip and it’s like she can hear it.

“What, what?” It’s almost exasperation.

“I just won’t be able to get a day off until... well, what about August, could that work for you?”

She’s silent for a moment. “You want me to come to Washington. In August.”

“Yeah?”

“You know that city’s built on a swamp?”

Ben chuckles. “We wouldn’t go anywhere without AC, and we’d take cabs everywhere and-”

“God, I never thought you’d have to _sell_ me on coming to see you. Alright, alright, I’ll see about booking tickets. We’re doing the Jefferson Memorial, though. I don’t care how hot it is. There are some things I’m willing to compromise on.” They chat for awhile about the things they’ll do when she comes and if Jenn will remember who she is and just how weird will it be to sleep with her in Stephen Chu’s bed.

He falls asleep that evening feeling lighter than he has in ages.

 

\---

 

Ben fucks up royally exactly once, sending out a press release before fact-checking it himself and it has Janx severely underestimating the amount of the national debt. The release is highlighted and poked at by Jon Stewart and Bill Maher and all Leslie has to say is “Well, at least you got on _The Daily Show_ kinda, right?”

He’s glad that’s all she has to say because after he hangs up with her, he punches the wall twice, throws up once and decides that two shots of bourbon are just what he needs.

He wakes up with a hangover and fights his way to a spot on the Metro and just as August arrives Ben feels like he’s had a bit too much of this damned city.

 

\---

 

He wants to go home.

And isn’t that something, that he thinks of Pawnee as home, now.

 

\---

 

Leslie arrives on a Thursday and he meets her at the airport. Chris (he’s working for another man named Chris and the weirdness about that will never, ever become something he’s used to) tells him not to come back to the office for at least four days.

When he tells Leslie this, she draws parallels to Josh and Donna and _The West Wing_ and he has to take her home immediately and taste her. They spend the majority of her first day in Washington in bed, riding out a series of thunderstorms with _The Bourne_ trilogy. They order in the District's best pizza (according to Yelp, and Yelp has never steered him wrong) and test the ability of the increasingly-thought-of-as-amazing-Stephen Chu's jetted tub.

They talk and talk and talk for hours, as though it hasn’t been three months away from one another, as though this hasn’t been one of the hardest things either of them has had to do.

They have sex. A _lot_.

They have lunch with Jenn (“Of course I remember Leslie, you jerk, how’s City Council life treating her?”) and sweat their lives away walking the Mall. Really, though, no one has any business walking this city in _August_. She fills up her memory card with face pictures of the two of them, the Washington Monument, Jefferson Memorial, Capitol steps in the background. She flips through the photos on Sunday evening as they’re laying in bed, cooling.

“Can you ever make a normal face,” she asks.

“Nope,” Ben yawns and rolls to grab her around the waist, pull her into his body. “S’just how my face is.”

They lay there, breathing together until Leslie says, “You like it here, don’t you?”

Ben thinks about that one. Does he like it here? He loves his job, not likes. He still wonders at the political process, he feels important and needed and _alive_ here. Not the city, he doesn’t really like that. Sure, there are aspects that he enjoys; the architecture is lovely and the people are all interesting and it’s diverse and full of culture.

But it’s not... it’s not home.

“I like it, yeah, I love Pawnee though.” Ben screws his face up in a weird amalgamation of a smile. “It’s weird that I... but yeah, I love Pawnee.”

“Huh,” rushes out of Leslie’s lungs and she turns in his arms so they’re face to face. “Huh.”

“Yeah.”

“I like that, that’s... good,” she tucks her head beneath his chin and wraps her around him, hangs on for dear life until they both nod off.

 

\---

 

After Leslie leaves, it’s like the fates know and kick his life into even higher gear. He’s being caught in photographs with Janx, even makes it into _The Boston Globe_. Leslie finds out and clips the photo, has it professionally framed and shipped to him.

“Ben “Mr. Bigshot” Wyatt, Apartment 7 B,” and he laughs so hard he almost cries.

There’s little-to-no sleep, just endless manilla folders and a phone that will _not_ shut up. He accidentally deletes two of her texts and she claims she understands but he can’t say he definitely would if it were the other way around. Ben fires two staffers and they can’t actually find the time or the money to hire new ones; they’re all running on nerves and caffeine and just like that, another few weeks are eaten away as September rolls around and he forgets to remember to wish Ann a happy birthday and for whatever reason, that results in a fight.

“I only reminded you three times, and it’s on Facebook for god’s sake!” she chastises over the line.

“Oh, it’s on Facebook, I’m not fucking twelve, Leslie, forgive me for not finding it in my day to check _Facebook_.” Then they both say some things they don’t really mean.

She claims that he’s beginning to become selfish, that he’s beginning to become the man she feared he would upon leaving. And he left her, he remembers that, right? That even though she wanted him to go, that he _left_ her. And he, well, he can’t help but point out how shitty it is that she’s pointing that out, that if he hadn’t gone he wouldn’t have been following his dream.

And how unfair would that have been? How _selfish_.

One of them hangs up on the other, or they both do, it’s really quite hard to tell. Ben fumes for awhile, walks around the apartment until it feels like it’s closing in on him. Then he’s out, on the street, walking towards the office and he can’t stop himself, has no end destination in mind.

He doesn’t even think about walking into the bar a few doors down; this is one of the only other places he comes even semi-often, other than the office and the apartment. He sidles up to the bar and realizes that he hasn’t been in this position in awhile. At a bar, alone. Back in Pawnee he’d be with _friends_ and here, he’s usually with coworkers.

Ben feels distinctly out of place. 

The bartender strides up just as he thinks about slipping off of the barstool but there’s a voice next to him saying “Two Bud Lights, please,” and then a “Drinking alone? That’s never good.”

Ben blinks over at Kate.

“Well, I guess, unless you’re a brilliant writer. Are you a talented writer and none of us are aware?” Ben sort of misses the joke and just stares blankly. “Right, well, this is usually the part where you thank me for getting you a drink... or at least acknowledge my existence?”

“Right, yeah, hi, thanks and... yeah, sorry,” he gives her a half smile and watches as she situates herself on the stool. “You’re uh, drinking alone too?”

“No, waiting on a date. I always, you know, have a round before I jump into those situations. Always so _awkward_.”

“Yeah, god, so thankful I don’t have to go through that anymore,” he says, mostly to himself. And he doesn’t, he never has to go on another first date again if he doesn’t want to. He never has to meet another woman, or try to find forever. His forever is in a dinky little Indiana town, waiting for him. Waiting for him to finish... living his dream.

“Yeah? Your lady was here recently right? Show her the sights? She fall in love with the city?” Kate takes a pull from her beer and watches him.

Ben blinks, “I don’t... I don’t... know. We just...”

And there’s silence, because he truly doesn’t know what to say. This is everything to him, right now. This is _it_ but there’s a part of him that’s missing; he doesn’t actually feel like himself unless he’s around her, and now in her absence, that realization is all the more unsettling. “Had a fight,” Ben finishes.

“Big one?” Kate asks, not looking at him but up at the Nationals game.

“Yeah, I think... so.”

She nods, asks, “Irreparable damage?”

“What? Oh, no, I mean, I don’t think so? Kate, I just... don’t know.” He fiddles with the bottle of Bud, shrugs.

“Shit, okay, my date is here,” she sucks down a few more sips and tosses a twenty on the bar. “But, I mean, I’m no authority on relationships here but if I had to say anything I’d say, if you want her or need her and love her, just go to her. This is just... a job, you know? I mean not a job, a fucking _amazing_ job, but anyway, gotta go.”

Ben’s left there with a beer that he doesn’t want, in a bar he doesn’t _really_ want to be in, in a city he kind of (?) enjoys, without the one person he wants. The one person he needs. The one person who he loves so much it cracks his bones and bleeds from his pores.

Ben leaves the bar, pulls out his fancy-schmancy iPhone with its “Janx for Congress” cover and fiddles around for a moment.

Turns out it’s remarkably easy to book a plane ticket on a cell phone.

 

\---

 

He doesn’t quite his job and he doesn’t move back but that weekend in Pawnee is overwhelming good for the both of them. They talk, again and they cry, the both of them. Pillows are thrown and words are shouted but when they’re through, everything is on the table.

Everything is understood.  
He’s going back to D.C. to finish what he started but in three months he’s coming back and putting a ring on her finger and no that won’t fix things, but it’s just something he really, really, really needs to do.

Because she’s Leslie Knope and he’s Ben Wyatt and the story doesn’t end any other way.

**Author's Note:**

> A thanks to fairytiger for being there as someone to chat to while writing this. Inspired in part by a piece she sent me and by the Barenaked Ladies song "Go Home." Title snagged from The National, "Baby, We'll be Fine." Enjoy.
> 
> ...fairytiger is my spirit animal, basically.


End file.
